The Dutch Republic was a cultural powerhouse in the modern era, producing lasting masterpieces in painting and publishing—in the process transforming those fields from modest trades to booming industries. This book asks the question of how such a small nation could become such a major player in those fields.

This book is the first comparative study of early modern English and Dutch women writers. It explores women’s rich and complex responses to the birth of the public sphere, new concepts of privacy, and the ideology of domesticity in the seventeenth century.